When you have the impulse to say something, there is a moment when you can check in with yourself, before you speak. You can ask yourself, “What do I want to happen as a result of what I say?”
This is how we create the habit of deliberate intention. In the moment when we are reactive, annoyed, defensive, or upset, we can use the intake of breath before words come to hold ourselves accountable for the impact our words will have.
What do you want to happen? What long-term result are you building towards? What effect will your words have on that outcome?
My husband Charlie and I were talking about this very idea this week, when he sent me a draft of an email he wanted to send to someone he was irritated with. I could tell that the intention of the email was “to get the upper hand by making him feel bad for wasting my time.” A few minutes after I read that draft of the email, Charlie sent me a revision. This new draft contained all the same information, but the intention had shifted. Now it was “to get him on board by explaining the plan another way.”
When I asked Charlie about the change later, he smiled and said, “Yeah, I had to write the first one to get it out of my system. Then I thought, okay, how can I write this so that I can get a better outcome?”
Implementing deliberate intention is easier when we’re writing a text or an email because we have a little more time to made that pivot. But developing the practice of asking, “What do I want to happen?” helps us think beyond the moment of our reaction to speak in a way that furthers the outcome.
